The dates are set

Debate commission to Trump: The dates are set

By Hadas Gold

The Commission on Presidential Debates responded to Donald Trump and the Republican National Committee's complaints about the debate schedule with a message on Sunday: The schedule is set.

"The Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD) started working more than 18 months ago to identify religious and federal holidays, baseball league playoff games, NFL games, and other events in order to select the best nights for the 2016 debates," the commission said in a statement. "It is impossible to avoid all sporting events, and there have been nights on which debates and games occurred in most election cycles. A debate has never been rescheduled as a result."

Trump and RNC officials have complained that two of the three scheduled presidential and one vice-presidential debates overlap with NFL games. Trump campaign Chairman Paul Manafort said the campaign staff would sit down with the CPD "in the next week or so" to discuss the debate schedule, and RNC Chairman Reince Priebus said last week that he believes the political parties should have more to say on the general election debate schedule. On Sunday, Priebus added: "Certainly we're not going to agree with anything that our nominee doesn't agree with."

The presidential debates are slated for Sept. 26 at New York’s Hofstra University, Oct. 9 at Washington University in St. Louis and Oct. 19 at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas. The vice-presidential debate is set for Oct. 4 at Longwood University in Virginia.

The bipartisan CPD selected the dates and locations in September 2015. The NFL announced its regular-season schedule in April. There's nothing unusual about games being scheduled on Sunday or Monday nights.

In 2012, each of the debates fell on football game days. Each debate attracted at least 58 million viewers, with the first debate drawing nearly 70 million.

"As a point of reference, in a four-year period, there are four general election debates (three presidential and one vice presidential), and approximately 1,000 NFL games," the commission said in its statement.

"The CPD selects the debate dates a year in advance in order for the television networks to have maximum lead time and predictability in scheduling these extremely important civic education forums. The CPD believes the dates for the 2016 debates will serve the American public well."

Later, John Podesta tweeted a response to the Trump campaign. "This is just more Trump debate malarkey. We will be at the debates set by the bipartisan debate commission and expect he will too," tweeted the chairman of Clinton's campaign.

Though the debates were set well before Trump or Hillary Clinton became the nominees of their parties, Trump’s campaign has suggested the Clinton campaign manipulated the process to guarantee the debates would be seen by fewer people. This theme was also heard by supporters of Bernie Sanders during the Democratic primary.

On Sunday morning, this line of argument was made by Jason Miller, Trump’s senior communications adviser, on CNN in an interview with “Reliable Sources” host Brian Stelter.

"Our position on the debates is we want as many people, as many voters, to be participants in and to see the debates as possible," Miller told Stelter.

Trump himself made the argument on Saturday in taping an interview for ABC's "This Week." He said: "HIllary wants to be against the NFL." He also said he got a note from the National Football League that agreed with him, though the NFL subsequently denied sending any such note.